Identity V Embalmer Novels & Stories

"Her body has been in our hospital morgue for almost two months now. Could you please come to identify and claim it?" I watched as Caleb’s entire frame went rigid. His hand froze in midair, the blood draining from his face. He forced out a bitter laugh, his voice dripping with disbelief. "Is this some kind of sick joke? Grace? That woman wouldn’t die even if the world were ending." "I’m sorry, sir," the voice on the other end continued, unshaken. "You’re currently listed as her primary emergency contact. You’re the only one we could reach." A sharp, humorless laugh burst from his throat. "Then, just treat her like an unclaimed body," he spat before slamming the phone down.

I was attended to by the mortician when he realized the reason I was there. He led me to a room where some of the dead bodies were laid on different tables. Right from the entrance, I saw a name at the edge of the room, it was wrapped on the exposed toe of one of the bodies. Riley Emerson. I stood still at my spot, unable to move when I caught a whiff of the burnt flesh in the room. Is that really.... I can't conclude till I see it myself. I mustered every ounce of courage within me and walked in further, towards the body. The mortician helped in moving the with cloth covering it and what I saw wasn't something I could recognize.

Ivan continued, "Grandma's eyesight hasn't been good lately, and you're still quite weak. Let me take care of Stuart's burial arrangements." Wiping her tears, Yasmin choked out, "Ivo, Dad always said he wanted to return to the earth after he died. Since Mom loved flowers, he wanted to become the soil for them to grow." In other words, she wanted a natural burial to be arranged for Stuart. This type of burial involved placing the deceased's body in a decomposition chamber, where it would break down over 30 days and turn into soil. This soil could then be used to grow plants and flowers, allowing the deceased to merge with nature.

We just need to polish everything so that no one will notice anything questionable. Doctor Hendrickson proceeded to give me the step-by-step procedure of what we would do. There will be two bodies inside the VIP ICU that Evelyn and her grandmother had occupied. Both will be covered with bandages and are already dead. Both bodies are just fake bodies that will be cremated once they are coded and declared dead. Then a funeral service will be assisting us, and we have decided to have it in the chapel near our ancestral cemetery, where they will be placed in our family mausoleum.

“What was that vial?” He swallowed so hard, she could hear it over the phone. “It’s a sedative, the extra-heavy kind used on movie sets to keep dead bodies from looking like they’re still alive. I learned about it in one of my photography classes. They don’t use it often because it’s so potent, but if you drink that vial, your family will think you’re dead.” Ella puzzled over his words. “They’ll think I’m dead? How does that help?” “They’ll take you to the funeral home. I have a contact there. I’ve already spoken to him. He’ll make sure you’re not embalmed or anything like that, so when they put you in the mausoleum with your mother, you’ll be fine.”

“I want a cut in the budget. We'll use a new technique to preserve the deceased.” “But how, Luna?” “We'll use natural ingredients to form formaldehyde. I think it'll be best in the preservation of the corpse.” “The ingredients remain the same, Luna. We cannot cut costs. The final moments of a corpse is important for the nearest generation.” “I understand.” I said. “But we do have to cut costs.” I said firmly. “I remember that Donovan pack has Formaldehyde as well as some embalming fluids for corpse. I'll contact them for some.”

, he said. "I really appreciate all your efforts. So, what did you find?", Rita said. She was itching for information, anything at all that could help her unravel the mystery that seemed to be her life. "The message was sent from a burner phone that we traced from a pick'n'go shop downtown. The person who sold the phone her no idea who the buyer is", he said. "So that means, the identity of this person is still not known?", Rita asked. "I'm afraid yes but we're working on finding out who this person is", he said.

Barely. “Isabel has nothing to do with you anymore,” I murmured, my voice low but firm. Rising to my feet, I signaled to the undertaker to wheel the fake body out. As I walked out of the operation room, Emerson’s cries still echoed in my mind. I didn’t look back. The plan was in motion, and there was no turning back now.

My Mom said, giving her a gentle smile. She nodded, making eye contact with each one of us. "The dead body that Val had brought home belongs to a person named Mark Garret, 34 years of age, a drunkard who was living out of the town. He died two weeks ago due to a car accident and was buried at White Oak Cemetery soon after." My brows deepened together as I scanned the profile in front of me. "Are you saying that the hybrid I had encountered has been dead all along before I even cut its head off?"

I wasn’t sure how she felt about it. Maybe she didn’t know either. She had barely looked at me since that night in the NICU. Since I had finally let her go. I glanced down at the caskets. One was polished mahogany, sleek and expensive—exactly what my mother would have wanted. The other was simpler, darker, almost as if it carried the weight of the sins attached to it. Javier Vargas had died a traitor. A man I had buried in secrecy. Now, he was finally being laid to rest.